“Constants Are Changing”: 20 years of Boards Of Canada’s ‘The Campfire Headphase’

20 years ago today on October 17th, 2005 Boards of Canada dropped their third full-length album The Campfire Headphase. It would take me another three years before Boards Of Canada got on my radar and would inevitably completely rewire my brain. Scottish brothers Mike Sandison and Marcus Eoin became an obsession for me, and still are to this day. How they approached electronic music in this very organic, dystopian, and psychedelic way connected with me on a very visceral level. I’d never really felt connected to any electronic music until Boards. It was less about movement and background sound for a dance floor. It was more about eliciting emotion based in a nostalgia for the past. And doing that via real instruments(as well as samples.) Processing drums, guitars, bass, and keys into something completely different…alien even. It was like they were creating their own version of nostalgia, and by using these old samples from the National Film Board of Canada made them all the more eerie.

If you ask me what my favorite Boards of Canada album is I would say most of the time that it’s 2002’s Geogaddi. But then the next week if you ask it’ll be Music Has The Right To Children. The week after that I’ll be neck deep in their many incredible EPs(Twoism, Hi Scores, Trans Canada Highway). But the one that brings me my own personal nostalgia would be The Campfire Headphase. It was the first one I had listened to, and at the time it seemed it was the least liked in their discography. That last bit I never understood as it feels like such a companion piece to what came before. It has all the wonderful hallmarks of a classic BoC record; subtle, low key grooves layered in hazy synthesizers and a present but not overpowering low end. It’s the perfect downtempo record.

Another reason this album sits so heavy in my psyche is the fact that “Chromakey Dreamcoat” was used in a quick spot on the kid network Noggin. It was this weird stop motion thing with a flower growing and BoC was the music behind it. I’d seen the commercial years before I’d ever delved into Boards, so it had made an impression on me. Years later when I sat listening to The Campfire Headphase in my basement studio with a few beers under my belt this song came on and it was instant deja vu.

I’ve been listening to The Campfire Headphase most of the morning and it still hits even after the 100th listen. There’s something about their hazy brand of druggy nostalgia that seems to hit extra hard this time of year. Most people call fall “football season”. I call fall “Boards of Canada season”, and it just fits. The Campfire Headphase is conducive to long, chilly walks under overcast skies. The ghostly nature of the music does have a slightly haunted quality to it, but not the scary sort of haunt. The kind of bittersweet haunting nature of going through and old photo album, or hearing a recording of a long dead loved one on a wobbly old cassette tape. Boards Of Canada is like a portal to a childhood of staying up late at night and seeing old commercials or cable access TV. And then when the “Star Spangled Banner” plays over shots of flags flying and WWII monuments you knew you’d stayed up too late. It’s like being up after the world shuts down, and it’s just you and your thoughts. It’s a beautiful kind of desolation.

That’s the feeling I get from Boards of Canada.

I’ll probably listen to The Campfire Headphase one more time before leaving work. Then when I get home I’ll be pulling out the vinyl collection and spin some more Boards of Canada over a pint or two.

Long live the “Dayvan Cowboy”.